Are Leads Managing us
or are we Managing Leads?
Part 1 - The future is now for better talent acquisition tools
Sgt. 1st Class Jeffery Crane, USAREC, Commanding General’s Initiative Group
Feb. 26, 2015
Today’s recruiter is the human component in a complex collection of systems, environmental factors, budgetary constraints and policies. These are the elements of talent acquisition.
However, compared to civilian counterparts, U.S. Army Recruiting Command’s collection is becoming increasingly burdensome and unnecessarily distracting to the handful of a recruiter’s critical tasks. In many ways, the technology replacing 200 card boxes and paper planning guides is a drag on the process, greatly impacting mission accomplishment.
Over the last six months or so, the Commanding General's Initiatives Group has been primarily focused on exploring the tactics, techniques, procedures, and systems the civilian industry uses to enable the mobile workforce. As we steadily move forward in accomplishing our primary mission of bringing USAREC into 2015 and posturing it to recruit Force 2025, one thing is certain and overwhelmingly obvious: as we move forward and adopt new technologies, we must also adopt new business practices.
Each year, our command uploads the contact information of more than 3.5 million enlistment-eligible students into the records database, creating a nationwide white pages prospect directory. At the time of receipt and upload, it is unknown how many of these 3.5 million have expressed interest in military service.
After upload, our "first to contact, first to contract" mantra kicks in and NCOs are charged with contacting the 3.5 million, while simultaneously contacting all of the now-graduated students uploaded in the previous two years. Significant amounts of time are spent attempting to accomplish this while our research proves that 2 percent of a high school graduating class will join the military before graduation.
We engage them without justification in their home, on the phone, on social media profiles, and via email. We invade their lives until a report says 100 percent or June 1, whichever comes first. If 100 percent is reached, we go back and expend more energy contacting them again. (Please note at this point that any of these 3.5 million have been referred to as leads.)
Contrast this with the way sales industry professionals manage and refine the records available to them in achieving their goals. The directory information they receive generally comes from only three sources: prospecting campaigns, advertising campaigns, and lead purchasing.
USAREC prospecting campaigns are table days or asset emplacement. Recruiters see counterparts at career fairs, community festivals and other major events with their 10'x10' booths. They collect information from people whom have approached their booth and expressed interest in their product or want a new tablet device.
Advertising campaigns are USAREC’s local and national media and print resources. Our counterparts benefit from highly-specialized, tightly-integrated campaigns on all forms of media (social, print, and broadcast) often using hashtags, text messaging, tracking URLs. These companies use analytics to judge the effectiveness of the campaign, while simultaneously ensuring appropriate localization of the campaigns, so the right message is in the right market at the right time.
Civilian talent acquisition firms purchase lead information from data mining organizations, which identify potential candidates based on their habits and interests via tools like Google and Facebook advertisements. The lead source that has virtually disappeared from the corporate landscape is cold calling, contacting people whom have expressed absolutely zero interest in their product.
So USAREC, let’s begin discussing changes to our business practices together to increase efficiency, empower recruiters, and shape our future Army. This conversation begins by performing an honest assessment of our current state to see where we may be coming up short.
Part 1 - The future is now for better talent acquisition tools
Sgt. 1st Class Jeffery Crane, USAREC, Commanding General’s Initiative Group
Feb. 26, 2015
Today’s recruiter is the human component in a complex collection of systems, environmental factors, budgetary constraints and policies. These are the elements of talent acquisition.
However, compared to civilian counterparts, U.S. Army Recruiting Command’s collection is becoming increasingly burdensome and unnecessarily distracting to the handful of a recruiter’s critical tasks. In many ways, the technology replacing 200 card boxes and paper planning guides is a drag on the process, greatly impacting mission accomplishment.
Over the last six months or so, the Commanding General's Initiatives Group has been primarily focused on exploring the tactics, techniques, procedures, and systems the civilian industry uses to enable the mobile workforce. As we steadily move forward in accomplishing our primary mission of bringing USAREC into 2015 and posturing it to recruit Force 2025, one thing is certain and overwhelmingly obvious: as we move forward and adopt new technologies, we must also adopt new business practices.
Each year, our command uploads the contact information of more than 3.5 million enlistment-eligible students into the records database, creating a nationwide white pages prospect directory. At the time of receipt and upload, it is unknown how many of these 3.5 million have expressed interest in military service.
After upload, our "first to contact, first to contract" mantra kicks in and NCOs are charged with contacting the 3.5 million, while simultaneously contacting all of the now-graduated students uploaded in the previous two years. Significant amounts of time are spent attempting to accomplish this while our research proves that 2 percent of a high school graduating class will join the military before graduation.
We engage them without justification in their home, on the phone, on social media profiles, and via email. We invade their lives until a report says 100 percent or June 1, whichever comes first. If 100 percent is reached, we go back and expend more energy contacting them again. (Please note at this point that any of these 3.5 million have been referred to as leads.)
Contrast this with the way sales industry professionals manage and refine the records available to them in achieving their goals. The directory information they receive generally comes from only three sources: prospecting campaigns, advertising campaigns, and lead purchasing.
USAREC prospecting campaigns are table days or asset emplacement. Recruiters see counterparts at career fairs, community festivals and other major events with their 10'x10' booths. They collect information from people whom have approached their booth and expressed interest in their product or want a new tablet device.
Advertising campaigns are USAREC’s local and national media and print resources. Our counterparts benefit from highly-specialized, tightly-integrated campaigns on all forms of media (social, print, and broadcast) often using hashtags, text messaging, tracking URLs. These companies use analytics to judge the effectiveness of the campaign, while simultaneously ensuring appropriate localization of the campaigns, so the right message is in the right market at the right time.
Civilian talent acquisition firms purchase lead information from data mining organizations, which identify potential candidates based on their habits and interests via tools like Google and Facebook advertisements. The lead source that has virtually disappeared from the corporate landscape is cold calling, contacting people whom have expressed absolutely zero interest in their product.
So USAREC, let’s begin discussing changes to our business practices together to increase efficiency, empower recruiters, and shape our future Army. This conversation begins by performing an honest assessment of our current state to see where we may be coming up short.